"Grei!!! It's me, Margie! Your favorite sister!" I chuckled a little, I could just feel her excitement from the other end but I composed myself again immediately for why should I be so excited, it took them 2 years to get in touch with me again, but I still replied in a pleasant way for old times' sake.
"Margie, how are you? Long time…"
"No, no small talk, let's do that later, where are you right now?"
"Why?"
"Just answer me, bro, I miss you so much, I could eat you alive right now" I chuckled again,
"I'm in Public State Highschool University Library at the moment, I'm on duty, I couldn't take this call for long also, by the way," I heard her talk to another person, I think it was Barbie, and they converse with each other,
"He said, he's in a Library, how far was that?"
"Go, check it on the maps" Margie got back on me again
"Hold on Grei, I'll just search for what we'll be able to go there, I'll put you on speaker" It took her two minutes
"Damn! Why are you so far away? Barbie, we are still an hour and a half away from him" I don't know what to say
"Where are you?"
"We are in a car about to get you, but we just got out of the dorm of National University. Barbie got her car back last month and we have been planning to meet you since then"
"That's good, but you really don't have to get out of your way to meet me right now, we could plan this again next time" Margie, flicked her tongue. She's still the same as before, a brat with a heart.
"No, we will come to you and we will wait until you are free" I giggled and answered,
"What if I still have 4 hours of duty ahead of me, right now?" Margie shouted in surprise
"What! Why do you do this? I always knew you'd kill yourself soon with overwork, it may be in school or work" I laughed
"I'm kidding, I still have 2 hours on duty, you girls will still have to wait for half an hour for me to finish work here" Barbie answered, I think, I'm still on speaker
"No worries, Gorgie, we could just stop by a drive-through first, I need caffeine in my system" I will say my goodbye
"Gotcha, I'll see you then, drive safe guys" they responded in sequence
"Bye! See you later!" by Margie.
"Bye, wait for us" by Barbie. I hung up and got back inside the library, it felt so fast, it felt like not even an hour when I got to see them, and they were just right on time before I clocked out.
"How are you?" Barbie asked, it felt like Barbie aged a bit, I mean more mature than before.
"Grei!!!" Margie jumped on me like a monkey that found its master, I almost lost my footing. She's still so bubbly.
"I miss you so much! I thought it will take a lot longer for us to find you!"
"Find me?" I thought
"What do you mean find me? Don't you know where I was?"
"We don't!" Margie almost cried to tell me that, Barbie started to explain as I looked at her
"Mom and Dad never told us; they even told us not to find you. We really don't understand that part, they just say that they don't want to put you in a strange position. But for us, we just saw it as an excuse not to get in touch with you, they couldn't even give us your phone number, Margie just told me that you are about to go back to your orphanage"
"I don't understand what Mr. and Mrs. Bumi's thinking"
"I see…" That's all I could say, Barbie continued
"We even have to snoop in Dad's study in their place just to get which orphanage you were in, I was pretty disappointed at myself at that part, that I didn't even take the time to know that before" Margie added
"It was because we never thought that everything would happen like that, I couldn't even imagine back then that you would have to go apart from us, we already loved you, when we saw you first. You were just the person we actually hoped for as a brother" Barbie,
"We're sorry about what happened, we will know sooner or later why our parents did that to you, but for us Margie, you are already part of the family, I'm sorry, it didn't look that way before but believe me, I consider you as my brother ever since"
"I never thought I would hear those words from Barbie, I just think that she doesn't mind or it doesn't matter at all even I exist or not at their home" Margie is still clinging to me, but I opened my arms while looking to Barbie and she took my hug.
"Thank you" That's all I could just say to them. Barbie cried for a bit but Margie took a while to stop her tears.
"I couldn't invite you to where I stay, I still live in the orphanage" We are now sitting in a local shop where I find the noodles tasty, that's what I ordered, Margie took the set meal with rice and fried chicken, while Barbie bought a burger.
"Margie, why do you keep scooping in my noodles? Is your meal not enough? Should I buy you a bowl?" Margie smirked
"You haven't told me that your order is special, I like the taste very much" I smiled,
"Yes, that's good you liked it, this is my usual in this place" Barbie started to ask
"What are your plans Grei? Are you willing to get back with us? Once you get into college you could apply to my university, I'm sure I could help you apply for a scholarship" Margie looked at me and I felt her stare, so I switched the spotlight to her
"How about you Margie, I know you are staying with Barbie, that's what Dad said when he talked to us that night, where do you go to school? Does the university offer senior high as well?" I was curious then Margie answered
"Mom and Dad still paid for my tuition; The university doesn't have senior high but close. When everything was a wreck at that time, they pulled Barbie from the university's dorm and they rented a studio apartment for us halfway to both our school. I almost didn't get to apply for the second year in senior high because the tuition and miscellaneous parts were a bit high and I couldn't get into any scholarship to help. I even already applied to work in a convenience store near us but Mom cried a river so that Dad could do something about it. I'm not that smart Grei, I told them that I could drop a year and just think of it as a gap vacation" Margie explained in detail then Barbie continued
"But mom couldn't take the idea, I think, they borrowed money to support her school expenses" Margie squealed
"But I still continued working part-time in that convenience store, Mom and Dad couldn't give us allowances regularly anymore which started almost a year ago already. Barbie is doing part-time too aside from maintaining her grades for the scholarship quota to support our apartment rent" I sighed softly
"Then, I guess it's not just me who's having a hard time but I never thought it would come to this, I even held a grudge against them for leaving me behind" Margie started to sob again, Barbie held her and squeezed Margie's shoulders at both ends.
"Barbie is so strong," I thought. Barbie looked at me and I thought she was waiting to hear from my side, I inhaled a deep breath and started my short story
"I'm okay Barbie, when I got back in the orphanage, the admins applied me immediately to Public High School. I applied for work almost immediately, not so heavy, just enough to support myself with additional allowance and everyday expenses, I still have to study hard to reach special allowances from the government and I have to work part-time for the orphanage, which gives me some pocket money, sometimes they bring me food."
"I didn't dare to say that Mr. Bumi gave me full control of the account they opened for me before and they didn't touch a cent on my savings in there" Barbie continued to eat her burger, I almost finished my bowl of noodles too, Margie couldn't swallow anything anymore, so I asked a waiter to put the leftover to take out package, her meal looks like it haven't been touched, but I believe she ate half of my bowl anyway.